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Poroshenko is frontrunner in Ukrainian elections

The Ukrainian chocolate magnate Petro Poroshenko is poised to win the presidential elections in Ukraine that are taking place on the 25th of May. Opinion polls place him first in the election, far ahead of any potential competitors. The current election will be the most important the country has had since it gained independence during the breakup of the Soviet Union. After former president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted in February, an acting president took over in Kiev – Oleksandr Tuchynov. It was under his tenure that Crimea seceded from Ukraine and eastern Donetsk provinces and Luhansk and Slovyansk declared their intentions to side with Russia if it came to civil war.

Poroshenko appealed to voters yesterday directly, asking for an unequivocal victory that would restore faith in the Kiev government. “…let us be realistic: if the election is not over in the first round, the second round might not take place. The level of destabilization might be such that we will have to fight for legitimacy,” he said last week during a visit to Odessa. Poroshenko suggested that further military pressure from Russia could derail the election, and inspire more resistance from the pro-Russian militias that currently control key towns and buildings in eastern Ukraine, near the border, where thousands of Russian troops are currently massed.

Russian president Vladimir Putin said during the CICI conference in Shanghai that the election was unlikely to solve anything, and it was more logical to hold a presidential vote after a referendum on a new constitution. He cited the difficulty of building relations with a government that has been conducting punitive military operations against pro-Russian militias. This fits it with Putin’s doctrine of protecting ethnic Russians throughout the former Soviet Union, a declaration which has made many in the FSU apprehensive of Moscow’s next moves. Putin additionally rebuked the Kiev government for detaining three journalists working for Russian news outlets in the east. The media atmosphere has become fraught with tension. Television towers are targets as both countries are seeking to present their contesting ideas to the world at large.

Poroshenko is leading the former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko by a large margin, as her star has diminished thanks to a jail sentence. The Committee for Voters of Ukraine expects a turnout as high as 70% for the election, and is expected to be particularly high in Kiev and in the nationalist, anti-Russian western regions.

Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev has issued statements expressing solidarity with his Iranian counterparts regarding the legal status of the Caspian Sea. A legal framework has been debated by Iran and Kazakhstan along with other states with claims to the Caspian, including Azerbaijan, Russia and Turkmenistan, with each of the parties interested in extracting a portion of the body of water’s rich deposits of oil. Kazakh and Iranian officials are expected to meet shortly with the stated goal of boosting cooperation in the Caspian.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has spoken out against Iranian hardliners who have lobbied for the internet to be banned in the Islamic Republic. Rouhani has countered statements made by declaring his support for technology initiatives within Iran, and encouraging the country to “embrace the internet.” Iranian internet usage is high among young people despite poor connections and active censorship.

The Tajik parliament recently introduced an additional clause to the country’s criminal code which will allow the state to prosecute Tajik nationals who leave the country to fight abroad. The new clause was introduced at a time in which an increasing incidence of Tajiks is leaving the country to fight alongside rebel groups in Syria. The new clause makes official an act which had already been prosecuted by the country’s supreme court as far back as December of 2013.

Asia Trans Gas, a Chinese-Uzbek joint venture, has announced that it will implement pipeline safety technology in order to “manage operations and help prevent safety problems” in the third in a series of pipelines that will span over 530km. Pipeline safety technology is becoming more and more of a necessity for large gas exporters due to a rapid expansion in the lengths of such pipelines, and seeks to provide pipeline managers with the ability to cut off gas supplies in the case of emergencies, and reduce the risk of fire and external disturbance.